Anyone tried Flowe Desktop?

.. it looks interesting

[4eyes]

Flowe desktop - not GPL, but free for personal use.

Just installed it - looks a bit of a Windows XP clone, but interesting nevertheless. The file manager seems pretty useful

(Sorry LM - I think it comes in at the wrong end of your 'lean and mean' scale - 80Meg download)

[littleman]

Looks like it has some nice functionality, and from the screenshots it looks like an enviornment where a recovering MS user would be very comfortable. I like that the developers don't seem to be overly wrapped up in eye candy.

[littleman]

So what do you think of it?

[4eyes]

Well so far so good

I am still a recovering Windows user, I guess:)

Good points:

Quick to load (considering whats "on offer")

Very Windows-like - its what I was looking for in the first week of transferring to Linux. Things are where I exepected them to be (my biggest gripe in my first week of Linux was spending to much time wandering around the menus)

Easy to install - picks up Gnome and KDE menus

It is surprisingly quick, and exudes an air of 'usability' (but see bad points below)

Bad Point:

Unbelievably, the only way to maximise and minimise the windows is the small button at the top right - ie clicking on the title bar does nothing and I can;t see any config option to enable this. This is a real killer in the usabiity stakes.

Adding menus and desktop shortcuts is not as easy as it should be. You have to enter the full path for the program - I am used to just entering 'sylpheed' and relying on the fact that Linux can find it. Another killer in the usability stakes.

It seems to be a 'work in progress', so hopefully these issues will be resolved in time.

Am I going to keep using it?

hmmm. .. swings and roundabouts... I don't know whether the usability benefits beat the usability problems.

I will advise more when it has "settled in"

{screenshot will follow when I get a chance)